Men's Cross Country

Matadors Post Solid Performances at Aztec Invitational in San Diego

Sep 15, 2012

SAN DIEGO, Calif. - The Cal State Northridge men's and women's cross country teams both had a solid afternoon on the course at the 2012 Aztec Invitational.

In the men's 8k, Hunter Hays finished first in a time of 26:48.2 on a rough cross country course. Hays won by out-running competitors from San Jose State and Point Loma over the last mile. Julio Mora finished third (29:12.4) followed by Martin Santillan in fourth (29:17.0), Marcelo Rosales in seventh (30:07.4), Steven Gonzales in eighth (30:23.2), Ezekial Glass in 11th (31:56.6) and Eddie Garcia wound up 12th (33:19.7).

As a team, the Matador men won the race by one point over Point Loma. CSUN posted an average time of 29:09.64.

"This is a great day for CSUN cross country," said head coach Avery Anderson. "This is the toughest course we'll run this season and this race gave us the opportunity to prove what we're made of. Running a course that gets tougher as the race goes on, we dug down when challenged and pulled out the team win."

In the women's 5k, the Matadors also finished strong as Araceli Zainos was CSUN's top finisher for the second straight meet. Zainos clocked a time of 19:15.1 followed by Yvonne Castillo-Urbina in 23rd (19:59.0), Fany Alvarado in 25th (20:06.4), Alexis Pichardo in 26th (20:07.6), Vanessa Carr in 35th (20:31.5), Kaitlin Janes in 39th (20:49.7), Kendahl Waalk in 48th (21:20.3) and Annalise Lopez in 53rd (21:57.8).

The CSUN women wound up fourth behind San Diego State, USC and Biola. The Matadors posted an average time of 19:59.92.

"I'm very proud of the fight the women showed, out here today," said Anderson. "As a team we've made tremendous strides this year. We're running as a unit and racing for each other. When your final scorer PR's on a course this difficult it shows the kind of tenacity we're running with."